Art of the Comeback!

My blog entry is way overdue.  Since the Men’s Urbanathon, I’ve been recovering from a physical injury which I haven’t disclose to anyone except for a few close friends and a need to know basis but suffice to say, it temporarily offset my usual running and Kettlebell training.  No matter what injury one encounters, recovery is an art form and those who’ve been down this road know what I’m talking about.  The two most important weapons in your arsenal in any longterm recovery is Patience and Nutrition!  I’ve been asked about my personal nutrition quite often and I’ve wanted to address this for quite a long time and I think this topic fits very well with this Blog post.

“A Warrior is only as strong as his obstacles”

 Injury is one of the most common and most dreaded  obstacle in an athlete’s career.  To tell an active individual who trains daily to sit, rest,and refrain from training is like taking the tires off a car, killing its soul purpose of transportation.   Inability to fight the   urge to train (fueled by fear of losing strength, gaining fat or losing momentum in progress), many athletes continue to workout and like that tireless car, may be able to go from point A to point B but you can rest assure further damage to the car is inevitable. This is where Patience plays its critical role in recovery.  Know that stepping back a step will allow you to leap forward two to three steps in progress whereas any additional step with injury is a leap back in the wrong direction.  Just like active recovery is part of the cycle of physical improvement, it is even more important to embrace this when injured.  Don’t let your fears overcome logic and sense.  Ally with Patience and you will always come out ahead. 

Personally, not running for a month was difficult but I fell back on my yogic practice as this is the source of all of my physical, mental and spirtitual endeavors.  I used this time to explore joint mobility, specifically Intu-Flow™  system as formulized by Coach Scott Sonnon.  His book Free to Move is indispensible and everyone, athlete and non-athlete should have this in their fitness library.   My past teachers and mentors have always emphasized joint mobility but Coach Sonnon’s approach is the most comprehensive system I’ve seen thus far and it really deepened my knowledge in this area.  Maintaining or acquiring full range of motion in your joints will speed your physical recovery ten fold.  Depending on your injury, adapt whatever movements you can if any and in time you will be back in action stronger than before.

So patience and working around the injury (if possible) with joint mobility exercises, and implementing a smart yoga practice that optimizes your mind and breath are the vital steps one can take initially, leaving us one more Key to a great comeback.  “NUTRITION”.   Feeding your body the correct nutrition is especially vital during recovery.  I’m no licensed nutritionist but my purpose here is to share some resource I’ve lived by and found very useful for myself and I hope that you will look into these resources for yourself.  During recovery, physical activity is usually very limited and so your diet should also reflect that.  In general, I eat (calorie wise) in proportion to my activity.  So if I’m not running 10 miles, I’m not going to eat as if I were.  In addition to amount of calories I take in, I pay very close attention to the “Quality” of my nutritional source.  In my opinion the “Quantity (caloric count of nutrients and percentage breakdown of the food groups) is the variable that needs to adjust to the individual but the “Quality” is a fixed factor.  You can and should investigate what diet template is most useful for your individual circumstance and implement it but when it comes to the “Quality” of your food source, one should look for the most nutritious foods especially during recovery.

My personal preference is the “Warrior Diet” as propagated by Ori Hofmekler which encourages daily detox through an undereating phase during the day and one main feeding in the evening.  Before dismissing this unconventional template, you owe it to yourself to read his book and see if it makes sense for yourself.   I’ve been on the Warrior diet principles for about seven years now. Of course I adapted and changed it to my lifestyle and activity.  The daily detox element is what attracted me and I really don’t count calories but depend on an instinctual feeding pattern.  In addition, I like to fast 3-4 days every month intaking a high fat concoction my Yogi Mentor taught me. 

With all of the running I’ve done this year, I stumbled across Brendan Brazier’s “Thrive Diet” book which emphasizes one step nutrition meaning ingesting foods that requires the least digestive activity.  Brendan is a world class endurance athlete who happens to be a Vegan.  You do not need to be or become a vegan to follow the suggestions in this book but I assure you will gain a lot from just following some if not all of the suggestions in this book.  Great recipes and breakdown of  ingredients.   I also fell in love with Brendans’  VEGA line of products, especially the whole food bars and shake.  Personally I don’t care for the “so called” healthbars which taste like crap and usually filled with chemical fillers but these bars are as good as the recipes from the book which I made with a food processor (well actually they taste better).

OK so here’s a recap of my approach to my “Art of the Comeback”

1. Accept that it will take time to heal and its ok to rest from the usual training
2. Work in Yogic breathing, asanas and daily joint mobility
3. Adjust my diet to reflect my amount of activity.  In a nutshell, eat less but more nutritious food to aid recovery.

A typical day of recovery and nutrition is as follows;

1. Wake up- Yogic exercises, Intu-flow
2. Followed by a Vega whole food shake which contains probiotics (this also serves a nutritional boost to start the day without taxing the digestive processess). Take my multivitamin
3. Drink water throughout the day
4. Evening meal (as much as I need to feel full, no caloric count)

In general, I like to acquire all my nutritional needs from whole food sources and limit supplementaton to a good multivitamin.  Keeping nutrition simple is the Yogic way of life.